Evaluation

Rowan Associates is passionate about good services, excited to find them.

Funding, from commissioning or grant making, is increasingly constrained. So, providers face increasing pressure to show that their services are needed, valued and effective. And funders need to know that their funding is well directed.

I specialise in evidencing impact and building qualitative evaluation data into a robust evidence base.

My work includes

Delivering project or outcomes based external evaluation

Working with you to develop tools and processes for self-evaluation

Supporting you to carry out your own evaluations

Gathering information from your stakeholders

Demonstrating the social value of your service or organisation

Researching the need for your project, service or organisation

We have a track record in producing clear and accessible reports and publications with realistic recommendations that can be put into practice.

External Evaluation

CLIC Sargent

I worked with Emma Insley http://www.insleyconsulting.com/ to evaluate CLIC Sargent’s Enhanced social care service for young people with cancer. We spoke with organisational stakeholders and with 37 young people with cancer, through interviews and focus groups. It was inspiring to find out about, and report on, CLIC Sargent’s offer of a Social Worker or a Community Worker, at “the worst time in your life.” Young people repeatedly described how the service enabled them to adjust to “the new normal” of life with or after cancer.

I worked with the Activity Plan delivery team to evaluate this HLF funded project to restore this Gatehouse to the Ashton Court Estate in Bristol. It is the only Gatehouse that will be open to the public, and is located in the grounds of Ashton Park Secondary School. The project involved working with community groups, and with the school as a gateway to the local community.

Self Evaluation

Rowan Associates is keen to enable organisations to build a culture of ongoing evaluation, without having to call in the external evaluators. To this end, I support organisations to evaluate their own work, usually by designing self-evaluation tool kits, impact assessment frameworks and social value measurements. Each is bespoke, designed for the needs of each organisation, and takes account of your working realities.

Increasingly, we work with clients to explore realistic mechanisms for assessing return on investment.

“Lori developed a bespoke Impact Assessment Tool Kit. This gives us methods for finding out what the many, different visitors and users of the Community Centre think about our facilities. It also shows the importance of a community building to the lives of the people who use its facilities. The questionnaire has a clear framework at its heart and this is giving us a valuable body of evidence. People have even praised the questionnaire!”Goska Ong, Manager, St Werburghs Centre

Quartet Community Foundation commissioned me to produce reports on the social needs of older and younger people across the four West of England authorities. The reports aim to inform Quartet’s grant making.